


Who We Are and Who We Have Been

by compassionfatigued



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Changes to Book 7, Explicit Sexual Content, Harry Potter Epilogue Compliant, Hogwarts Seventh Year, M/M, Past Rape/Non-con, Past Sexual Abuse, Second War with Voldemort, We'll see what happens - Freeform
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-01-01
Updated: 2021-01-13
Packaged: 2021-03-10 19:01:35
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply, Rape/Non-Con, Underage
Chapters: 4
Words: 10,917
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28472067
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/compassionfatigued/pseuds/compassionfatigued
Summary: Harry gets separated from Ron and Hermione on the hunt for horcruxes as they run from a group of snatchers. Ron and Hermione get away, but Harry ends up in the dungeons of Malfoy Manor. He soon realizes that he's not alone, and that Draco Malfoy is being held there as well. They may not be on such opposite sides any longer, but the war is still trying to tear them apart.
Relationships: Draco Malfoy/Harry Potter
Comments: 2
Kudos: 34





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> This is my sick at home with coronavirus quarantine project. I'm not 100% sure where it's going, so we'll find out together, but I'm happy to hear comments or thoughts! A lot of the story so far is from Draco's point of view and focuses on childhood trauma and recent sexual abuse. I imagine this taking place at the time when the three were held at Malfoy Manor in the books and plan to follow up with another story in the same sort of verse at epilogue time.

“Harry, please!” He whispered as loudly as he felt he could safely get away with, struggling to keep himself moving forward with the other boy’s weight so fully surrounding him. “Please keep moving. We have to go! If we get caught now, we’re dead, and I mean that as literally as you can take it! They will kill us, please!”

The other boy could not even be considered upright at this point. Draco was shouldering the majority of his body weight as he dragged him along the corridor, Harry’s feet shuffling against the hard dirt as he struggled to make his body do anything. He was so weak; his head and his legs felt like concrete. Everything he saw was dark and fuzzy, with occasional flashes of lights behind his eyes. He knew that Draco was trying his absolute best, that he needed to stay awake and do whatever he could to keep his legs moving somehow so as not to burden him any further, but he felt like that possibility was getting further and further away. He couldn’t keep his eyes open, could barely sustain his hold around Draco’s waist, but he knew this was their best chance at staying alive, and he had to do something.

“Draco,” he whispered, the boy’s name coming out so quietly he wasn’t sure he’d spoken it aloud except for the intense pain he felt in his throat at using his voice after so much screaming. “Num- numb—number tw-elve. Grimmauld Place.”

“What is that?” Draco asked, his whisper harsh and sharp in the quiet darkness.

“Need—to get—safe—we’ll… be safe.”

“We need to go there? Where is it? How do we get there from Wiltshire?” But Draco knew that Harry wouldn’t answer any of these questions. He grew heavier against Draco’s side, with Draco heaving him up again, hoisting Harry’s arm up and over his shoulders so that he could carry as much of Harry’s weight as possible. “Great.” He whispered to himself. His plan beyond this tunnel was almost non-existent. Wipsy, his favorite house elf since he was young, had told him to follow the tunnel until it brought him above ground about a half mile outside of the manor grounds. She had told him that then he’d need to apparate to safety, that she’d keep everyone occupied as long as she could, but that the wards would trigger against their absence and she would only be able to stop it for so long. Draco felt the path growing steadily more uphill as he dragged a now-unconscious Harry with him. He knew he’d only be able to go on for so much longer, and he hoped with everything he had that the end was coming soon. He didn’t know how he’d manage to apparate when he did get outside the wards—he felt so weak, and apparating without a wand was already so much more exhausting, let alone with 150lbs of dead weight at his side. He briefly considered leaving Harry in the tunnel and making his way outside the wards alone where he could apparate away. He knew that this was the coward in him talking, knew that any attempt he made to convince himself that he could make it back to Harry before he was found was a poor lie he was telling himself.

He had to keep going. He would make it to the end of the tunnel, apparate them as far away as he felt he could safely get, and then he’d figure out what to do next. He’d figure out what to do about getting them to Grimmauld Place. Wherever that was; he’d make it happen. They were so close, and he knew it was likely Wipsy would die for giving them this opportunity. He wouldn’t let her sacrifice be in vain. He wouldn’t let Harry Potter die. This was bigger than him, and he had to keep that in focus.

He wasn’t sure how long it took them to reach the end of the tunnel and make it outside the Manor grounds. He knew it was longer than the twenty minutes Wipsy told him it took her when she tried it, but the stabbing pains in his side and the permanent kink in his neck reminded him that Wipsy hadn’t been dragging a half-dead body with her. This had significantly slowed him down, but he knew it was all the more reason he needed to be moving faster. Harry’s condition had been deteriorating by the day. He was starting to suspect that Harry had internal injuries, that whoever had used his body last had gotten careless and done too much damage. Harry being Harry had insisted that he was fine, but Draco had seen his energy steadily decrease, had watched what was left of the fire in his bright green eyes dim, and now he was dragging his limp body behind him. He knew he’d need to rest before he tried to apparate somewhere he’d never been before, but he also knew he couldn’t rest long. He didn’t know how long Harry had, but he had a bad feeling that it wasn’t as long as he needed.

Breaking above the tunnel into the light of day was something more beautiful than he’d felt in a long time. It was freezing in November in Wiltshire, and a steady drizzle soaked him through in seconds, but he couldn’t help the levity he felt in his chest. This was the first fresh air he’d seen in almost a year. He fell to the ground in exhaustion and gratitude, mud soaking through the thin linen of the pants Wipsy had brought them. He sucked in air like the tunnel had been underwater. He heard Harry fall with a thud beside him and knew that this feeling of freedom and levity was short-lived. There was no time to bask in their escape. Harry wasn’t conscious and in this cold rain he’d only sink further, faster. Draco knelt next to him and felt for his wrist with a shaking hand. He felt the thrum of a pulse under Harry’s skin and felt relief, but the relief was tempered by dread with the realization of how unsteady and quiet that pulse had become. Throwing sense and fear to the wind, Draco wrapped his arms tightly around Harry’s lifeless form. He reached for the warmth of his magic and tried with everything he had left to wrap its protective heat around Harry. With that, he gulped one last deep breath of air and felt himself twist into nothingness.


	2. Chapter 2

Draco came to in a quiet room painted the lightest blue. There was sunlight streaming through a big double-paned window that warmed his face in a way he hadn’t felt in hundreds of days. His body ached, and the pain that had developed in his neck from lugging Harry for miles underground burned fresh as it had that night. _Harry_. He thought, realizing he didn’t know where they were, or who he was with, or where Harry had gone. He sat bolt upright; a low, guttural sound of pain wrenched from his lips before he had the good sense to stifle it. He looked around frantically, hearing a faint whirring noise coming from somewhere he couldn’t locate, his vision tinged with a fuzzy light.

“Easy, Mr. Malfoy,” a quiet female voice soothed from across the room. Draco’s head whipped in the direction of the sound, wrenching another low moan of agony from deep in his gut. “Please, you’re going to hurt yourself. You’re safe here; lay back down and rest.”

The woman came into view then: maybe his age or a year older, she was slender, fair-skinned, with caramel-colored hair, deep blue eyes, and a warm, genuine smile. Draco tried to hold onto his panic, knowing that letting his guard down was unwise, but he felt himself disarmed by this gentle presence, the first woman he’d seen in many months, and the first friendly human face he’d seen outside Harry’s in even longer. _Harry_. He thought again. “Where is he?” He croaked, his voice tight and pained. He struggled to look around again, agonizing over the possibility that Harry was lost, that he hadn’t kept his promise, that he hadn’t kept him safe.

“Mr. Potter is in the room next to this one. He’s in rough shape, but I believe he’ll be okay. It was touch and go… for a while, but I believe he’s through the worst of it.”

“Harry’s here? He’s alive?” Draco dared not to let himself hope just yet.

“Yes, Mr. Malfoy, Harry Potter is here; he’s safe. You likely saved his life.” Her eyes were liquid ocean and Draco searched them hungrily. He hoped it was true, but he was so afraid. After everything, it was so hard to believe they could be safe.

“Where are we? Can I see him?” He knew he wouldn’t feel calmed until he could see Harry for himself, until he could touch his skin and feel his pulse beneath his fingers.

“You’re at Grimmauld Place, headquarters of the Order of the Phoenix. Harry must have brought you here right before he lost consciousness—I don’t know how he managed to apparate in that state.”

“No,” Draco shook his head, realizing now that it had worked, that he’d accomplished what he dared not to dream possible. “He told me that we’d be safe here. He told me to bring us here—I just didn’t expect it to work.”

“It takes a lot of magic to slide-along apparate somewhere you’ve never been before without a wand. I can see why you’d be surprised.”

He felt further disarmed by her praise, by the kindness in her voice and the furrow of her brow. “I didn’t know I had that much magic in me,” he said truthfully. “I just knew I had to get us out of there. I had to get him to safety—can I see him, please?”

Her eyes were sad and unsure, but she nodded solemnly. “You’re too weak to be up and about, but if you can agree to stay here and stay calm, I can dissolve the wall between the two rooms so you can see him.” Draco started to nod but stopped abruptly at the pain that shot through his spine. He hissed sharply. “Please be as still as you can. There’s a lot of healing magic working on your body, but it’ll take time.”

“I’ll do my best; please, just let me see him.”

The woman waved a hand casually and the wall disappeared. Draco took note at such a casual display of wandless, nonverbal magic. With another wave of her hand, he felt the bed he was in spin slowly to face where the wall had been. He craned his neck slowly, begging his eyes to focus on the prone form lying motionless in a bed at the edge of the room. Seeming to notice his struggle, the woman walked forward, using her magic as if on an invisible string to pull his bed closer to the bed at the other end of the room. She stopped him a foot away from the other bed, and for the first time the face framed by messy black hair became clear to him. He saw the thin scar across the young man’s forehead. It was the first time he’d seen the other boy sleep without his face contorted in nightmares.

He was beautiful. His skin was pale, his face gaunt; Draco could see a long gash mending itself along the side of his face and down his neck. Still, he was one of the most beautiful things Draco had ever seen. The steady rise and fall of his chest brought Draco more joy than he remembered feeling in a long time. “He’s really going to be okay?” Draco asked in a whisper, too afraid of giving his hope volume.

“I have every reason to believe so,” she said. “The first few days were very touch and go—he’d been bleeding internally and there were some complications with his magic—but he’s been stable for the past two days. He’s under stasis currently to give him more time to heal, but in the next few days I’ll lift that and see how he does on his own.”

“How long have we been here?” Draco asked then, entertaining for the first time the idea that they didn’t just arrive.

“A little over a week,” she told him calmly, radiating that quiet energy as if she knew it would upset him.

“A week!” He shrieked, shocked that this could be true, that maybe this safety would last. “I’ve been out for a week?”

“You were under stasis as well for the first couple of days. That hefty use of magic took a lot out of you, and you had your own injuries that needed healing. You still aren’t healed, as I know you feel, but you are doing astoundingly better than you were when you arrived here.”

Draco paused for a moment, still watching the rise and fall of Harry’s chest, before uttering the question he most wanted to ask. “Why did you save me? Why would you put so much into healing me? You know what I am.” He said the last part softly, glancing down at his left arm that was covered now by a soft maroon long-sleeved shirt. He knew that wasn’t what he’d arrived here in. He knew that in her caring for him that she had cleaned him up, redressed him, had seen all of him. He also knew that she knew his name. Even without having witnessed the mark on his arm, he knew that she knew what he was. She’d known the whole time she’d been caring for him and speaking to him, and yet she’d treated him with nothing but kindness. He didn’t understand.

“I’m a healer, Mr. Malfoy. It would be against my oath to let anyone suffer, regardless of their beliefs or choices. But also,” she looked him in the eye, her gaze pinning him where he sat. “A true death eater wouldn’t have risked his own life to bring Harry Potter to safety. And…” she paused then, seeming to weigh her words carefully before she spoke. “I know to some extent what they did to you—to both of you—and there’s no world in which I wouldn’t try my best to help someone who went through what I imagine you did.”

Draco felt his eyes tear up then, thinking about the past year, about the past many years. He felt the enormity of it and the weight of relief that he might finally be safe, at least for now. He knew she could make assumptions about what he’d experienced based on the kinds of injuries he’d endured, and he tried his best not to think about what kind of picture that might paint, about the assumptions she’d made about what he’d experienced and from whom, but that didn’t stop him from picturing what had actually happened. He felt a hand on his arm then, felt a flood of warmth from that place that tingled like unfamiliar magic. It stilled him, calmed the excessive beating of his heart. “Thank you,” he whispered, his eyes still glistening.

“Of course,” she smiled. “Why don’t we get you back to your space so that you can take some more pain potion and get some rest. You’ve been through a lot.”

Draco’s blood ran cold with fear. “Can’t I… can’t I stay here… with… him?”

She must have felt the fear in him, or seen it wash suddenly over his face. She pushed more of her warm magic toward him. “You can stay in here with him for now if you like. He needs a lot of monitoring so if that disturbs you and you can’t rest then we’ll have to make an adjustment, but for now I’m fine with it if you feel you’ll be able to rest.”

“I’ll rest much better knowing that I’m near him,” he assured her. He knew this was too vulnerable, too intimate a statement to make to a stranger, but he couldn’t find the energy to stop himself, to hold his mask up.

“Very well,” she nodded, holding out a small phial of bright purple liquid. “Drink this and get some rest, okay, Mr. Malfoy?”

He nodded and took the phial, “Draco, please, you can call me Draco.”

“Of course, Draco,” she smiled back at him. “I’ll see you when you wake.”

He downed the sour liquid in one gulp, trying to hide how disgusting he found it. She smiled at him once more, took the phial, and left the room. His last thought as he fell asleep, hand reaching to thread with Harry’s motionless fingers, was that he hadn’t even asked her name. His savior, this nameless healer who had saved both of their lives. He faded into blackness with more peace than he’d felt in a long while.


	3. Chapter 3

When Draco woke, his feelings of peace had all but vanished. He felt the energy in the air had shifted—tense magic pulsed around him and the voices he heard from the hallway were far from cordial. He could tell they were trying to argue quietly, their voices gruff in the tightness of whispers, but they certainly weren’t succeeding. He briefly wondered if they’d tried to cast a silencing spell before deciding that he was far more curious about what they were actually saying. He did his best to focus his still-fuzzy brain on what he could make out of the tense conversation.

“Remus I am done arguing about this! I’ve given my word and until Harry wakes or you gather enough people for a vote to force me to act otherwise, it’s final.”

“I know you say you trust him, but if you trust him as much as you say, what is the harm in letting us talk to him?”

“I do trust him; I spoke to him yesterday, and he was worried about Harry. He wasn’t worried about himself, didn’t ask what would happen to him, just wanted to assure that Harry was okay. That boy went through just as much trauma as Harry did, and there’s no need for us to traumatize him further. When he is well, you can speak to him, but until then you and I have nothing more to say to one another.”

“And if you’re wrong,” he asked then, his voice lowering to a volume that was extremely difficult for Draco to make out.

“Then I’ll admit it, and I’ll apologize. I’ll own the judgments I make and any consequences that come from them. But this boy won’t suffer needlessly because of us.”

“Have you forgotten what he’s done?” The other man—Remus, Draco remembered—said then, his volume increasing astronomically as his frustration clearly boiled over.

Draco had enough at this point. He knew they were talking about him, arguing about whether he was a bystander or a threat, and he figured at this point the least they could do was say whatever it was they thought to his face. He glanced over to where Harry was still sleeping soundly and slowly unwound their fingers. He would go out there and tell them that he could hear them, and that they could just argue in front of him. But he was so tired. He sat himself up with exceptional slowness, steadying himself before he threw his blanket back and swung his legs over the side of the mattress. He realized then that his feet were bare, his legs clad in a pair of soft grey muggle sweatpants. The maroon shirt he’d been wearing before he fell asleep had been replaced by an equally soft deep blue long-sleeved shirt. He wondered briefly about how his clothes had been changed, realized that he hadn’t had to pee since he’d regained his consciousness, and pondered on how these things had been addressed. Shaking this off as something to worry about much later, he slid forward and allowed his bare feet to touch down on the cool dark wood floors. He pushed himself up through his feet and knew instantly that he’d made an egregious mistake. He dropped like dead weight, his legs tingling and numb with lack of use. He hit the ground with a hard thud. He hardly had time to identify the position he was in when the door at the opposite end of the newly expanded room burst open. The healer sprinted toward him, a man in his mid-forties close behind her, his wand drawn and ready to strike.

“Draco!” She exclaimed, skidding to a halt in front of him and dropping to her knees. “What happened? Are you okay?”

Draco noticed that the man hung back, his wand still drawn, his eyes weary. “I was just trying to get up,” he mumbled quietly, rubbing at his sore calves, his body and his ego feeling tender. “I heard you in the hallway and I just—I wanted to—I figured if you were going to talk about me you should at least do it in front of me.” It felt stupid when he said it aloud. These people had saved his life unnecessarily; he supposed they had the right to talk about him.

The healer’s eyes went wide. “You heard us?” She asked quietly, looking behind her at the man still holding his wand, though now slack in his fingers.

Draco gave a small nod. “I appreciate your putting trust in me,” he said to her then, eyes still focused on the floor. “Though I understand why you don’t,” he said then, tilting his head in the direction of the man. “And if you have questions for me, I am willing to answer them.”

“Draco, we appreciate that,” the woman interjected, putting herself between him and the other man as if to offer further protection. “But it’s too soon. You’ve been through a lot and _obviously_ your body needs time to rest.”

He winced at her pointed nod to his current position. He propped himself up with an arm behind his back and she took pity on him, gathering herself up off the floor and offering him support to stand. After a few moments, the feeling returned to his legs. He felt steadier than he had when he’d tried to stand earlier but knew that he shouldn’t push it too far. She helped him back into bed and adjusted his blankets over him. “I know that physically I’m not up to much,” he acknowledged hesitantly, “but I know it must be important for you to know what I know, or at least to understand what happened.”

“It is important for us to know what happened,” the man interjected from behind them. For the first time, Draco recognized his voice, put it together with his more ragged appearance, connecting both to a professor they’d had at Hogwarts but struggling to attach a name. “Harry has been missing for over a month. We all feared the worst. And you’ll excuse me if I have concerns about him showing up in the condition he was in, with you, given your history.”

The healer flashed him a nasty glare as he edged forward next to her. The man seemed unapologetic. “I’ve done a lot of things I’m not proud of.” Draco said softly, staring down at his pale hands, following the lines of his fingerprints with his eyes to steady himself. “I am prepared to be held accountable for my crimes.” He did not have anything to argue this man with. He had done horrible things. He was sure the man had seen him do some level of terrible thing at school—it was who he was at the time. And it didn’t stop there. He was responsible for Dumbledore’s death. He was responsible for people being maimed by Greyback. He did not doubt that Wipsy was dead now, the latest in a long line of cruelties his existence inflicted on the world. He was spiraling, he knew, but he didn’t have anything left to fight with. He’d been fighting for so long, for months, years, though he had to admit he’d long given up fighting before Harry came back into his life.

“That is _enough_ ,” the healer declared firmly, glaring daggers at the man next to her. “Remus, I’m sure you can see yourself out.” There was no space in her voice for arguments, and the other man knew it. He huffed quietly and turned on his heel, swiftly exiting the room, the door closing with a loud _click_. The healer turned to Draco, slumped against the head of his bed. “I’m sorry about that,” she said then, her eyes gentler and sincere. “Remus means well—he’s one of the few people Harry has left, and he’s very protective of him—but he can be intense.”

Draco looked up at her wearily. “It really is alright. He has no reason to trust me, even less if he knew me at school. He was a professor at Hogwarts a couple of years ago, wasn’t he?”

Lily nodded. “Professor Lupin; I believe he taught defense against the dark arts.”

Draco barked out a laugh—the werewolf, of course! “Well then he has even less reason to trust me than most. I was not kind to him, and my father fought hard to have him removed from Hogwarts. I certainly don’t blame him; he could’ve been much less kind and I wouldn’t have reason to fault him.” He paused then, thinking about how to phrase what else he needed her to know. “I appreciate your trying to protect me just now, but certainly protecting Harry is far more important than that, so if I do need to talk to him now, it’s okay; I can do it.”

“You’re both my patients, and I’m here to care for both of you. One of you is not more important than the other.” She said simply, as if there were nothing else to discuss.

“You lot really are so _noble_ ,” Draco said then, the word “noble” coming out more like an insult than he intended.

To his surprise, the healer laughed. “You don’t have any reason to trust us either, I suppose, Draco. I can see how my actions would seem insincere to you. It’ll take time for you to believe me, and that’s okay.”

Draco sat stunned for a moment. He felt like his emotions had been playing tug-of-war with his insides for the entirety of the time he’d been awake. He wanted to believe her. After such a long time being the only one looking out for himself, he wanted to believe that someone else would carry some of the load. Still, it felt too risky to believe her.

As if sensing that he was losing touch with the conversation, the healer redirected him. “I’ll be removing Harry’s stasis charm tomorrow. It’ll take about a day or so for him to come out of it, but after that he should be lucid.”

Draco felt a balloon expand in his chest. “You’re going to wake him up?” He asked, doing his best not to sound too hopeful.

“Yes,” she nodded. “He’s been stable for 48 hours, so he should be stable enough.”

With that declaration, Draco felt a fresh wave of exhaustion crash over him. He thought about talking to Harry. Things had been different between them over the past month—they’d been close, tender with one another, if he was being honest, but he knew that so much of that was the stress of the situation. He feared that things would be different when Harry woke, when he realized he didn’t need Draco any longer to stay safe. Draco tried to push these thoughts from his mind. He tried not to let himself hope too much, but he tried not to crush himself either. “That’s a relief,” he said at last, meaning those words with every fiber of his being.

“It is,” she agreed. “So hopefully that will give you some peace of mind to rest some more today, yes? You should get back to sleep.”

Draco nodded, the exhaustion sinking further into his bones. “I’ll go back to sleep,” he agreed. “But first, can I ask you—I don’t even know your name.”

Her eyes widened. “Of course,” she exclaimed. “How rude of me! I’m Lily Clearwater. I would’ve been in your year at Hogwarts, I believe—Ravenclaw—but our parents took me out of school following the escape of Sirius Black.”

“I wondered,” Draco said then, giving voice to something that he hadn’t consciously connected before then. “I thought maybe I’d seen you before.”

She nodded. “We may have had a class or two together first or second year. And my sister was Head Girl, so the name might be familiar. She had finished her seventh year the year before and without her there my parents were too afraid for me to stay, so they decided to continue my schooling at home. I do miss it, but it afforded me a unique opportunity. My parents were friends with a renowned healer, the head of St. Mungo’s magical traumas ward, and a part of my schooling from home was apprenticing under a healer for those next four years.”

“I wondered how you could be a healer so young,” Draco blurted, realizing how against his pureblood upbringing it was to comment on a witch’s age.

She chuckled. “Yes of course; I’d be surprised if you weren’t curious. My healing magic has always been advanced and apprenticing with such a renowned healer opened doors for me that most other apprenticeships wouldn’t have. Still, few places would even finish interviews with me when they found out how young I was, but the Order took a chance on me.”

“So, this wasn’t your first choice?” He asked, unsure why he felt so curious about her, why he found himself blurting questions with little regard for decorum.

“Oh, it was,” she said earnestly, smiling. “But my family hated the idea of me working privately for anyone, let alone in the middle of the war. They felt it was much too dangerous, let alone not particularly good for my resume if things turned out poorly. And of course, they wanted me to be available to them, to be able to see them as I pleased.”

“You don’t get to see your family?” He asked then, again startling himself with his care for and interest in her. It’d been so long since he’d spoken to someone outside the manor, and he’d never spoken to someone like her.

She smiled sadly then. “It’s not that I never see them, but it isn’t often any longer. I’m the only healer the Order has right now, and depending on what’s happening, that can be a pretty busy position to be in. And it can be a dangerous position, being associated with the Order; I have to be scarce to protect them.”

The next words tore from Draco’s mouth before he could stop them. “This just doesn’t make any sense to me.”

“What doesn’t make sense to you,” she asked, her eyes bright and curious.

“Why are you helping me? Why are you even talking to me? Why are you telling me anything about yourself?” He felt himself getting angry, at himself, at the choices he’d made, at his family, at the situation he was in. “ _I’m_ the reason you’re in that position. People _like me_ , are the reason. _Why are you being anything other than horrible to me_?”

“It’s like I told you before, Draco,” she said, locking her eyes onto his, smiling warmly, “You’re not like the others. Regardless of how you treated me or behaved, I would’ve done my part to assure that you didn’t die—that’s the oath I took and it’s one that I take very seriously. But beyond that, I have some idea of what you’ve gone through, as well as what you did to keep Harry alive, and that tells me enough about you to want to share pieces of myself with you.”

Draco felt his eyes burning. The tears were coming, he knew it, and he didn’t want to let it happen. “You don’t know anything about me.” He spat; the words far less sharp than he’d intended.

“Not much,” she agreed, tipping her head in acknowledgement. “But enough to think that I might enjoy knowing you better.”

“You’re giving me far too much credit.” He said softly, the heat he’d tried to muster gone from his voice. The tears broke over and he wiped his sleeve against his face quickly.

“Maybe,” she smiled, “but I don’t think you’ll make me regret it.” She patted his arm softly. As if sensing that he would try to continue the argument, she rose to her feet. “Get some rest, Mr. Malfoy. If you still feel like it, you can try to convince me otherwise tomorrow.”

With a final smile she turned and walked toward the door. Draco felt dumbfounded. He felt off-balance, and his head swam with conflicting thoughts. He was exhausted. The conversation with her and the other man felt ages ago, not simply a few moments or an hour. He shook his head, trying to shake some sense back into himself. He’d been too open with her—a side effect of all of the sleeping draughts and healing potions he’d taken, he was sure—and he’d be sure to keep a tighter hold on his emotions going forward. But here, in the warmth of his small, hospital-type bed that was now directly next to a still stasis-addled Harry’s, he allowed himself to feel the smallest bubble of hope. It seemed that this healer, despite a host of good reasons not to, _wanted_ to help him. And Harry would be coming out of stasis soon. He tried to hold these two things as good news, tried to allow the bubble of hope to stay alive here in the privacy of his own head, in the quiet of their shared space. Things would be different when Harry woke, but maybe, just maybe, they’d still be connected in the ways they’d been before. Draco admonished himself briefly for this hope. He knew his parents would hate that thought, would’ve ridiculed him for even considering any kind of friendship or kindness toward Harry Potter, but he remembered that his parents were in large part the reason he was here. He shut down that thought before he allowed it to go any further. He would not think about his father. He wouldn’t think about his lost inheritance, or the home he’d never be allowed to return to, or all the reasons he left. Those things were behind him and dwelling on them would do nothing to bring back the life he once had.


	4. Chapter 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> TW: Non-con in this chapter. Please skip it if you need to; the story will still make sense without the bulk of this chapter.

“Harry came out of stasis well,” Lily told him the next morning. “He probably still won’t wake for a couple more days, but he’s remained stable for the past five hours.”

“Five hours,” Draco replied. “What time is it?”

“It’s about one in the afternoon.”

“Am I ever going to stop sleeping this much?” He asked, incredulous at the time that had passed since he’d spoken to her last.

She chuckled softly. “Yes, you will. No need to be dramatic.” Draco mustered enough energy to look offended at her use of the word. “Your body is _healing_. It’ll take time until you feel 100% like yourself again.”

“How badly was I injured?” He hadn’t really allowed himself to think about this before, to wonder about his own wellbeing even after he knew that Harry was going to be okay. Knowing that it’d been almost ten days and he was still sleeping almost constantly, he wondered just how close they’d come to serious trouble.

Lily’s smile drooped, her eyes darkening. She gave a heavy sigh, conjuring a plush black chair with another casual wave of her hand. Draco was beginning to wonder if this woman ever bothered with a wand or if she just liked showing off. She pulled the chair closer to his bed and sat herself down, folding herself cross-legged onto the soft surface of the chair, absently fiddling with the hem of her mustard-colored sweater. “You were not well, Draco. You had a couple of internal injuries, multiple broken bones, multiple bones that had been broken and improperly healed, multiple torn ligaments, damage to your vocal cords, and a handful of infected or poorly healing wounds. You also had a variety of magical damages. I’ll go on if you need but cataloging your injuries in detail will likely be more traumatizing than helpful.”

“They really did almost kill us, didn’t they?” Draco knew it came out as a question, though a hardly audible one, but he already knew the answer. He’d waited too long to get he and Harry out of there. They’d come too close to not making it out at all.

She nodded sadly. “You both came very close I’m afraid. But you’re both out of the woods now, and we need to focus on helping you heal.”

“I really don’t know how to begin to do that,” he said truthfully, kicking himself for already going back on his resolution to share less emotion.

“That’s okay,” she said gently, reaching out to take his hand. The gesture disarmed Draco in a way he wasn’t expecting. “I’m here to help with that. It’ll all take time. The physical things are already healing, and we’ll help you get your strength back. As for the emotional things, I’ll support you the best I can, and we can try to find you a specialist in mind-healing at some point if that’s something you’d like.”

“I don’t think I could ever go to a mind-healer.” He recoiled at the thought. He certainly felt crazy at times, but he didn’t want to openly endorse it like that.

“You don’t have to,” she said, not wanting to push him, though believing that this was exactly what he would need to truly deal with what he’d experienced. “At least not yet; that’s just not my area of specialty. But to be able to help you, at some point—it does not need to be now—I’ll likely need to understand a little more about what happened to you, if you’re willing to talk to me about it.”

He knew this time was coming, knew that he needed to talk about it for a number of reasons, but that didn’t stop the pit of dread from opening up deep in his gut. “Of course,” he whispered, clearing his throat to try to regain his illusion of steadiness. “I’ll tell you whatever you need to know.”

“You don’t have to share anything you don’t want to,” she said in what he assumed was supposed to be a reassuring tone. “And again, you certainly don’t have to talk about it now. Like I said before, you need to rest. You don’t need to add the emotional distress.”

“I appreciate that,” he said honestly, “but I don’t know that I’ll ever feel _ready_ to talk about it. I think I just have to.”

“That could be,” she conceded, “but I still think it might be too soon.”

“I don’t know,” he replied, “maybe it’ll be good practice for talking to… Professor Lupin, or whomever else I need to speak to. I imagine you won’t be able to hold them off forever.”

She sighed. “At some point, yes, there will certainly be an investigative interview; I imagine it’ll be Remus and maybe Kingsley who you’ll speak to, though it could be a number of people, depending who is available. But it’s not the expectation that you share all of the traumas you experienced in that space.”

“It might not be your expectation, but I imagine it’s others.” He took a breath, feeling unsure but bolstered at the same time. “I think…I think I’d like to try to talk to you first—before all of that—I imagine you’ll be gentler than they will. And maybe you can put in a good word for me.” He laughed halfheartedly, knowing he wouldn’t get that lucky.

“I can’t guarantee anything, but if it’s possible, I will provide an abbreviated version of what you tell me so that you don’t have to relive it for them. Would that be helpful?”

He continued to be astounded by her willingness to try to help him. “Even if you have to show them a memory of our conversation in a pensieve, I’d be glad to only have to do this once.”

“Like I said, I can’t guarantee anything, but I’ll try my best.”

Her willingness boosted the last of the courage he needed. “I haven’t had a lot of opportunities to talk about this, so I can’t guarantee I’ll have words for all of it, but I’ll try my best to.”

“That’s all I can ask of you,” she said kindly.

“Can we do this now? I think…I think I want it to be over.”

She nodded. “If you want to do it now, I am okay with that. Would you like to go somewhere more private? Harry isn’t awake, but it’s possible he can hear or register what is being said in a way that he couldn’t when he was under stasis.”

Draco shook his head. “No, it’s okay. Harry and I have talked about a lot of this. He knows a lot of what happened.”

“Okay,” she smiled gently. Draco wondered briefly if she found that odd, but if she did, she certainly didn’t make it known. “If you’re sure. Are you ready?” He nodded slowly, steeling himself for what was to come. She paused then too, clearly trying to decide the best way to start this conversation, the question to ask first. After several long, drawn-out moments, she spoke. “How long has this been happening to you, Draco?”

Draco knew this wasn’t even a difficult question, that of the things he’d have to explain or relive, the age at which he started experiencing this was hardly something to spook at, but he couldn’t help it. The question brought up those first memories, that first time—at least the first time he remembered. He cleared his throat, speaking haltingly. “I… don’t know exactly.” He said honestly. “The first time I remember, I was… eleven. But I tried so hard to block those memories out—I don’t know if I was just successful before then or if that was the first time.”

She nodded, her eyes kind. “It’s really normal for memories of traumatic things to be fuzzy or temporally disorganized.” She paused again, matching the halting nature of his responses. “So, from what you remember, the first time was when you were eleven—does that mean you were at Hogwarts when it happened?”

This question surprised Draco, though he didn’t know why. It would’ve made sense for that to be the case. He almost wished that it had been. He shook his head. “No…it was a couple—the day before I left. It was the day before I left for Hogwarts the first time.”

“Do you feel like you could tell me what happened?” She asked, her voice quiet, as if hoping not to spook him.

He knew that to do this he’d have to put himself back there, but he also knew that he’d done it once before. He found that her brilliant blue eyes were almost as easy to trust as Harry’s startlingly green ones. He took a deep breath. He still struggled with knowing where to start. “The day before I was set to go to Hogwarts for the first time, my father invited me into a room of the manor I’d never seen before. He and my mother each had their own wings of the manor—as did I—so it wasn’t completely unheard of to be taken to a place I’d never been before. The room was plush and dark, with two big cushioned armchairs. He told me so many things I wanted to hear. He gave me a drink of firewhiskey and told me that I was going to become a man of the house.” He laughed coldly, thinking back on how good that felt at the time, and how little he wanted it now. He felt almost completely detached from the words he was saying, keeping himself away from the emotions of the memory. “He told me that he wanted me to have a special memory of the two of us. He told me that he wanted me to feel like the man I was becoming.”

Draco hesitated, the emotion of the moment coming closer to him than he wanted. He took a deep gulp of air. “I was…fuzzy…from the firewhiskey. Before I knew it, he was right in front of me. He…was on his knees, in front of me. He…unbuttoned…my pants and put his hand inside.” Draco’s insides were screaming but he kept talking, wanting this out of his head, out of his body. “I tried…to tell him ‘no,’ to ask what he was doing…but he put…his other hand…over my mouth. I remember trying to get away, but…he used a sticking charm.” That detail had escaped Draco’s memory until then and saying it out loud brought up the feelings of panic. He thought that distantly he heard Lily try to say something, try to interrupt him or tell him he didn’t need to keep talking, but he felt possessed with it. He wanted it OUT of him.

“He used the sticking charm, and I couldn’t move. I remember trying to scream but he…he closed his hand over my nose as well so I couldn’t breathe.” Draco felt his body begin to shake. “His other hand was still…on me. I could feel myself starting to react and I…I didn’t know what to do. I froze. And when I froze, he just kept saying things to me, about how good I was, how special, how this was something for us. Somewhere in there he…he removed my pants. He kept the one hand over my mouth and then…he…he put his…mouth…on me. He…sucked me off…and then when I was done, he…he climbed up me and stuck…stuck his tongue in my mouth. He started…touching himself…and kissing me…and rubbing himself on me…until…until he came all over me.”

Draco could feel the tears well in his eyes for the first time, the feelings of confusion and helplessness in his gut as if he were stuck back in that chair. He felt her come closer, clearly wanting to show she was near him but not wanting to touch him without his permission. He felt thankful for her in a way he hadn’t expected. “He left me there for…a while…I don’t know how long. Half-naked and covered in…him. He walked around and did things…sent letters, did just…ordinary things. While he left me there like that. When he finally let me up…he…he told me he couldn’t wait until I was home next so he could see me like that again.” He felt the tears spill over, but he pressed on. “He swore I’d be disowned if I said anything… He said it was…special…just for us. And it went on like that for…a long time.”

He felt a warm cloth pressed gently into his hand and gratefully wiped the tears off his face. He knew if he looked at Lily, he’d see pity in her eyes, and he didn’t want that. He didn’t want to see it. He’d seen it in Harry’s eyes when they talked about this, the first time he’d ever told, and once was enough. He knew she wouldn’t have pushed him to continue, that she would’ve let him be done here, but he knew that meant it would have to come up later. They both knew this was hardly the end of what he’d endured. “That year…or maybe the next one… he started making me suck him off in return. And then after a while…he’d make me do it several times before he would…touch me. And then…fourth year…Professor Snape caught me snogging Blaise Zabini. I’d been pretty sure I was gay for a while by then but…I was confused. I didn’t know what to do with that, if it was because of what I’d experienced. I was… exploring. I begged him not to tell my father. I told him that something bad would happen to me but…it didn’t stop him. He firecalled my father the next day. It was the week before the holiday break, and I knew—I knew something bad was going to happen when I got home.

“But I didn’t know what to do. I was too afraid of being disowned to tell him what I feared would happen. My father didn’t often use…physicality…as a punishment—I mean it certainly felt like one, but that wasn’t usually how he framed it—and when he did it was…brutal. That year, when I got home for the holiday, he let me have dinner with he and mother in the dining room, but he wouldn’t look at or speak to me. I don’t know if mother knew what was happening or what was going to happen. I’m…hopeful…that she didn’t, but if she did, she certainly…didn’t stop it. When dinner was over, he told me to meet him in his wing and…I knew something different and bad was going to happen.” His shaking was exceptionally noticeable at this point, but he pushed himself forward, gasping between words for breath to keep going.

“I knew what that meant, so I went straight to… ‘our’ room. I knew avoiding it would make it far worse, though I certainly thought about it. As soon as I got there, he locked the door and threw me on the floor. He said…he said…if I was going to…act like a ‘faggot’ that he’d…teach me to take it up the ass like one.” He heard Lily try to interrupt again, but he held up a hand to stop her. Silent sobs were shaking his body, but he felt more in control of the story than he had in the past. “He yanked me off the floor and…ordered me…to strip. When I didn’t…do it fast enough, he stripped me naked with magic, and tied my hands above my head. He transfigured one of the chairs into a bed and…forced me onto it face down. He dragged me by my tied hands up to the top of the bed and tied them there. My face was in the mattress—it felt like I could hardly breathe—and he forced me onto my knees. And then it was like…” he gulped, the tears coming back in full force.

“He ripped me open. He didn’t…prep me…didn’t…use any…lube. He…fucked me…dry. I don’t know how long it lasted. I know I passed out once or twice but that he revived me when I did---he said I…needed to… _feel_ it. Feel him. At some point I started bleeding. And when he was done…he just left me tied like that. I thought I’d pass out again; it felt like I’d lost a lot of blood. I guess father worried about that also—after some time, another man came into the room. He was a healer. He healed some of my injuries—father made sure to specify that he not take away any of the pain—and then father unbound me so that I could… let him ‘fuck my face’ as payment.” He felt the tightness in his chest ease as he realized he’d told the worst of it, that the worst was over. “That was the first time he’d ever let someone else use me, but it… it certainly wasn’t the last. He never fucked me dry like that again, but he was…brutal…in other ways when he wanted to be. And then when the manor became…when the death eaters and the Dark Lord came…I became their plaything.”

She put a hand on his arm then, gently, clearly trying not to startle him but insisting on interrupting. She spoke quietly, her voice soothing and warm. “Draco, I appreciate so much that you told me. It took a lot of courage; you have been so brave. And I want you to rest now. You’re stronger than you were when you arrived, but reliving trauma is an exhausting thing.”

The words themselves, he imagined, could have felt hollow, or insincere, but he’d learned by then that things never seemed to sound this way coming from her. She was everything he’d hated so much about others in the past—vulnerable and open, warm, genuine, and enthusiastically authentic—all things he’d been taught not to be, to consider weak. But he found that on her, in these moments, he liked this about her. It was a comfort he’d never been given before. Even sharing with Harry in their quiet nights alone in the dungeons, Harry had never known what to say. He’d held him, let him cry—and those moments were special to him in another way, so novel and private—but hearing those words was soothing in a new way. He nodded slowly, taking her hand. “I am very tired,” he said then, closing his eyes and letting the tears fall freely. “But I think there’s another part you need to know.”

“Okay,” she nodded. “Whatever you want to tell me, I’m here to listen.”

He sucked in another deep breath; his head bowed. “The night that I tried to kill Dumbledore…the night he…died. Was the first night…the…the first night…the Dark Lord…used me…like that.” He felt the tears increasing, white hot against his face; he’d never said this part out loud. Harry had known, because Harry had seen it, had felt it with him. He couldn’t have imagined how hard it would be to get those words out. “He was…angry…at me, but…celebrating. I’d never seen him so…volatile. I hadn’t felt pain like that since…the first time…with my father. But it became…normal…a regular occurrence. And when other death eaters…did things he liked…or won his favor…he let them use me…like a reward.” He paused then, a hard sob shaking his body. “When they brought…Harry…to the dungeon…they started, I think…I think they had meant…to kill him right away…but they started…using him, the way they did me, making us…do things…to one another, and it was like…they couldn’t stop themselves. But toward the end, they just got…rougher, more…violent. I knew it was only a matter of time before…before they killed us anyways; even if it wasn’t on purpose.”

He brought his eyes up to meet her bright blue ones for the first time. He felt so… _raw,_ but he didn’t want to have to do this again. He wanted her to _know_ , wanted her to understand just what he and Harry had endured. What he saw looking back shocked him. Her eyes were brimming with tears, her cheeks damp as if she’d been crying for a while, perhaps even the whole time he’d been speaking. He searched her eyes hungrily, trying to understand. “You’re crying,” he said. It wasn’t a question, but he knew it’d come out as one, that his confusion was evident. His earlier resolution to hold his emotions in check was laughing at him from wherever it had run away to.

She shrugged, the corners of her mouth pulling up in a small smile. “I’m a very emotional person, Draco—sometimes too much for my own good. But I lead with my heart and it works for me. I feel so sad for the pain you’ve endured, and so humbled and grateful that you shared with me.” She wiped gently at her eyes with a small cloth like the one she’d given him.

“I don’t think I’ve ever met anyone like you,” he said then. He felt a warmth inside him as he pondered her words. He didn’t like that his sharing hurt her—he was so tired of hurting people—but he felt… _relief_ …relief that someone else could see his pain, acknowledged that it was real. He’d never expected that, here of all places, and he didn’t know what to do with it.

“There’s a first time for everything,” she replied, her eyes glinting with a touch of mischief. Draco wondered how he could read her so easily; felt, though he dared not voice it, that he’d known her a long time. “What do you need right now?” She asked then, surprising him again with such an unfamiliar question.

For the second time in just a few moments, there was no word for it beyond “dumbfounded.” Had he ever been asked that before? What did he need in that moment? “I think I’d like…a shower,” he said haltingly, thinking about washing the entirety of their conversation off of his body. He didn’t know how long it’d been since he’d been allowed to shower. He could tell that he’d been cleaned up—his skin was bright and healthy, though as pale as ever—but he wanted the physical act of it. “Is that possible?” He could hear the hope tinge his voice.

She smiled encouragingly, untangling herself and standing up, removing the chair with a flick of her hand. “Let me put a few things in order, set up the space in a way that will be good for you, and I’ll be back, okay? It’s going to wear you out, but if it’ll help you feel more at ease, I’m happy to accommodate.”

Draco tried his best not to let the guilt of creating extra work for her eat at him as he watched her leave the room. When she was gone from sight, he turned to study Harry, taking his hand again. For the first time since he’d been awake, he felt Harry’s fingers curl around his. Fire licked the inside of his belly and he knew he was in big trouble. As he’d come to see his safety as a real and tangible thing, he saw more and more clearly the way that things with Harry would end. He knew the other boy wouldn’t be holding his hand if he were awake and oriented, certainly not if he knew they were going to be just fine. Draco was coming to terms with the fact that what they’d had in the dungeons, real and visceral as it had been, was something temporary. He knew he should be preparing for that reality. He unwound their fingers, admonishing himself for his frivolous displays of affection. He might not be able to help himself with Lily, but he could do a better job of keeping his wits about him with Harry—Potter, he reminded himself.

Lily came back into the room then, startling him out of his intense thoughts. “Ready?” She asked, looking at him expectantly.

Draco couldn’t remember the last time he’d felt so _cared for_. She supported him as he transitioned upright, waiting for him to steady and shouldering his weight as she led him out the door and across the hall into a big, well-lit bathroom. The black tile was surprisingly warm under his feet. Outside, the sun shone brightly; he felt it warm his face, felt himself smile. Grimmauld Place was different than he would’ve expected a headquarters for the other side of the war to be. Over the course of the time he’d been there, he’d felt a thrum of dark magic from somewhere within the house. He kept expecting to see it, pleasantly surprised to see the lightness and airiness of the spaces he was in instead. He’d missed light so much, windows and the warmth of the sunlight. “I think you’ll find everything you need in there,” Lily said quietly, pointing with her free hand to the shower. “There’s a bench in there—please don’t be absurd and try to stand the whole time; you will fall, you’ll get hurt, and it’ll create more work for all of us.” She unwound herself from him, confirming that he could in fact stand on his own. “How steady do you feel? Can you get undressed on your own?”

Draco felt himself flush warm. In truth, he wasn’t sure how steady he’d be, but he certainly didn’t want to ask her to help undress him. He’d done enough to damage the little dignity he’d come here with. “I’ll be fine,” he said, far more confidently than he felt. His legs already felt tired from the amount he’d stood on his own, but he wanted to prove to himself that he could still do something.

She didn’t seem fully sold on his ruse, but she nodded. “Alright, well, if you need anything, please don’t hesitate to call out. I’ll be right outside the door just in case.”

Draco considered for a moment arguing, telling her this was unnecessary, but he decided against it. With his luck he would fall and Professor Lupin would find him, in the same poor mood he’d been in the previous day. He didn’t need anyone finding him in a vulnerable position, but he acknowledged that if it had to happen, Lily was the safest person. “Thank you,” he said quietly, doing his best to put as much sincerity into his voice as possible. She nodded again and slipped out the door, leaving him alone. He decided it was best not to take his chances, stepping into the stone shower and setting himself down on the bench before attempting to remove his clothes. He hadn’t seen his full body in a while, certainly not in a well-lit space, and while he’d spent an inordinate amount of time chained naked in the dungeons, he’d long ago learned to stop looking, knowing that watching his body deteriorate didn’t help him. He looked hungrily now, curious to see what shape he was in. He was shocked at how thin he’d become, how clearly he could identify each rib under all of this light. He knew he’d likely gained weight since he arrived here, and he shuddered to think what he had looked like upon his arrival.

***

The shower did wonders for Draco’s mood. He felt happier than he had in a long time, and he relished his time underneath the hot spray, the scents of balsam, cedar, and evergreen that swirled around him. He scrubbed until his skin was pink and tingling, knowing he’d gone a little overboard but unable to help himself. This was his first opportunity to wash everything that had happened in the dungeon off his body, though he wasn’t sure he’d ever feel fully clean again. Lily had called in a couple of times to check that he was okay, assuring him that she wanted him to take as long as he needed. That warm tingling feeling shot through him, acknowledging again how good it felt to be cared for in this way. When he finally turned the water off, he heaved himself up off the bench, pulling back the steamed glass door and looking around. He hadn’t thought of a towel at the beginning, but his mistake was apparent as he clutched the door, dripping wet. He shouldn’t have worried. A second of closer inspection found him a soft grey towel, fluffy and somehow warm, folded neatly on the shelf to his immediate right. He wrapped himself tight and stepped out, sitting himself down a moment later on the toilet seat, out of breath but satisfied. When he’d finally regained some of his energy, he heaved himself up again, making his way for the first time to the mirror over the sink. He hadn’t seen a mirror in even longer, and his curiosity overwhelmed him. Once again, he was shocked at how thin he’d become. His face was gaunt, sunken in a way he’d never seen before, and his eyes were ringed with dark circles. His hair was longer than it’d been in years, shaggy and a bit uneven, and his face was scruffy with stubble. He supposed he could ask Lily to perform a shaving charm—he didn’t imagine they’d let him have a wand to do it himself.

He looked down to the countertop and found a pair of muggle sweatpants and a soft black long-sleeved shirt—his new wardrobe apparently—set out and folded for him. She really had thought of everything, and he felt comforted by her care and detail. Getting dressed was a bit more complicated, and it again, took a lot out of him. When he stepped out of the bathroom over an hour later, he was right and truly knackered. He gratefully took Lily’s offered support to make his way back to the space he shared with Harry.


End file.
